************************************************************** * * * CYBERSPACE * * A biweekly column on net culture appearing * * in the Toronto Sunday Sun * * * * Copyright 1999 Karl Mamer * * Free for online distribution * * All Rights Reserved * * Direct comments and questions to: * * * * * ************************************************************** On January 22, 1998, Netscape issued a press release stating it was planning on freely distributing the source code for its Netscape Communicator web browser. Many a programmer peaked over his cubicle January 22 to see if four horsemen were following in the wake of Netscape's announcement. In the software industry, giving away source is akin to a bank giving away the keys to the vault. Since the days when Bill Gates first started carrying a business card in his wallet that said "Microsoft," source code has been a software company's most guarded secret. You may give away your compiled executable but you never give away "source." Source is the underlying high-level language (like C++) that gets compiled into an executable binary file. If someone has your uncompiled code, they can learn all your programming secrets and create their own competing applications. Derivative works are legal under copyright laws. The specter of hackers modifying Netscape's code wily nilly isn't all that scary to the browser maker. That is what Netscape hopes will happen. By harnessing the wild talents and untapped genius of thousands of programmers all over the globe, Netscape hopes its browser will become absolutely integrated into the net's operation. When a company wants to do business on the net, it will naturally have to buy Netscape's commerce software. Free doesn't mean Netscape will completely abandoned intellectual property rights. Netscape will offer the code under the terms of ***the Free Software Foundation's** "GNU" license (***see www.gnu.org***). A GNU license allows you to retain your rights to new and useful code. For example, if you come up with a brilliant new graphics compression algorithm, you may still sell and license that algorithm to Microsoft even thought it is part of a GNU-licensed program. Others are still free to distribute the GNU-licensed source code containing your innovation, but they are prevented from snipping out your work and selling it. GNU is an acronym which stands for "GNU's Not Unix." Programmers are not only fond of three letter acronyms but they get a kick out of recursion. As GNU's expansion implies, it is closely associated with but not limited to Unix applications. Depending on who you talk to, the Windows world breeds either avarice or individuality. It's a product of the Reagan-Bush era. Unix culture is communal. It's early adopters were mainly ex-hippies. Netscape's seemingly desperate move was prompted by some of the remarkable developments to come out of the Unix world. Hackers, working individually, connecting only via email and FTP software, engineered a free version of Unix for Intel 486/Pentium computers called Linux. While the genesis of Linux influenced Netscape's move, it was a paper by Eric S. Raymond called "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" that according to Eric Hahn, Executive Vice President at Netscape, was a "fundamental inspirations." Eric S. Raymond is a rare individuals in the software world. He's a respected programmer and a powerful communicator. Raymond is best known to netizens as the editor of the hilarious "Jargon File," the authoritative guide to hacker slang and culture (see earthspace.net/jargon/jargon.html). Raymond is no one hit wonder. He has contributed significantly to two important Unix applications: Emacs (a text editor that has spawned a religious following) and a popular email utility called Fetchmail. He uses his experience with Fetchmail's open source development methodology as a basis for his "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" paper. Traditional software is produced in the "cathedral" fashion. Programmers cloistered together create applications and then deliver it to the faithful. Raymond's paper analyzes the "bazaar" style of development that produced Linux and his own Fetchmail utility. He distills the essential rules that must be in place to produce an insanely great application out of a chaotic mix of programmers. You can view what may prove to be a historic document at www.earthspace.net/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar.